Fine High Grade Pepper and a Photocopier. Review on Julie Ganapathy Movie

Julie Ganapathy (Saritha) is an individual of questionable sanity who happens to be an ardent fan of a popular television series by the name of Manga. Over the years, Julie has grown to identify herself with the lead character in this serial. The author of series Balamurugan (Jayaram) leaves his home for a few days to be alone to write the last few episodes of ‘‘Manga’’. On his way back home after completing his work, his vehicle meets with an accident which leaves him seriously injured and crippled. Julie rescues the man and takes him home. But little did he know that Julie is not as normal as she appears to be. Julie is an emotionally unstable woman who is deliriously obsessed with the character in Bala’s story. This drives her to the point of insanity. Julie asks Bala to allow her to read the last episodes that he had just completed. Bala is left with little choice but to let her read the script. Over the next few days she reads the story and finds the ending not to her liking. She forces him to re-write the ending by various means. The rest of the film is about his struggle, torture and adventure to escape from the clutches of his crazed captor. Brilliant story and a fine plot, but no credits to Mr. Balu Mahendra, who, in fact, does claim writing credits for this film. I always try hard not to compare our films with their films. But Mr. Mahendra leaves me little choice. Misery is a modern horror classic by Steven King. The book was later produced into a successful film starring Kathy Bates and James Caan in 1990. The motive behind the production of this film is what actually puzzles me: This film will not be a blockbuster simply because it lacks the blockbuster Formula: There are no pretty lasses running around. No romance. And the hero doesn’t even walk on two legs. And yes Ramya Krishnan does dance around in a wet sari. Neither the film nor the screenplay is an original work of art, hence cannot even be judged for its literary quality. So in short this film cannot claim aesthetic nor commercial excellence. I would like to know what motivated this celebrated film director to ‘‘write’’, edit and direct this film after almost five years of silence. Can we call this a good adaptation of Misery? I am afraid not. In the process of Indianising Misery, Balu Mahendra invents an extra character to the story which manages to ruin the otherwise perfect story. Julie's father ‘leaves her alone to travel to the US. A father leaving his mentally ill daughter alone in the house with a revolver and a hunting rifle does sounds a bit odd to me. In King’s novel there are no such characters to worry about.

Cast Superb performance by both Jayram and Saritha. Saritha will probably be known as the actress who played the most evil woman in Tamil cinema. She displays raw frenzy and delirium. Brilliant performance. The fight and struggle scene was horrific and rather realist. Jayram as always is great. I could experience pain when I saw his acting in this movie. The sexy Ramya Krishnan doing her thing is not to be missed. That’s about it. Everyone else is pretty much insignificant in this film.

Cinematography Balu Mahendra's camera work is mediocre. The camera doesn’t move in this film. It appears to be bolted to the floor. There seems to have been no effort made to liven up the scene. Most of the events in the film happens in one single room. Since this room is the main stage for the story they should have used a well rigged three walled studio room set with proper camera tracks and cranes. Instead the room used is actually the four walled room in a real house. Throughout the film there are no dolly or track shots done in the room. probably because of lack of maneuvering space to lay proper tracks. Mr. Mahendra seems to take great pride in proclaiming that he did not use artificial light for this film. There is nothing smart about using natural light if it produces dull and unimpressive footage like in this film. Poor portrayal of dynamic perspective and professional lighting makes the photography of this film look very much out of dated. The room is a very important aspect of this story as it is Bala’s prison. His imprisonment and isolation could have been shown by wide angled 24mm over head shots of the room. Instead the entire film is shot with probably the same boring lens. These lenses do not give any perspective and leave many of the shots with a 2-dimensional flatness. The lack of depth is evident in every shot. The constant backlight behind the bed is a good idea, but it has been poorly implemented. The magnitude of light varies constantly sometimes flooding the screen, and at times so weak that one cannot even make out features. Either he has to bring his technical skills to date or leave the job to professionals who are already in the industry.

Music Plenty of well orchestrated strings have been used for background score and Illayaraja’s magic touch can be felt. A slight hue of Bernard Hermann (Music Director for most of Hitchcock films) can be heard in some scenes. In the scene where Jayaram attempts to get out of bed; the music is of desperation and helplessness. It would have been more appropriate if it conveyed a sense of suspense and urgency. Since Bala is trying to escape, his mental state has not been accurately captured by the music. Music and photography is what adds atmosphere to a scene. Music cannot salvage what has been royally messed up with shoddy photography.

The Script To attempt a review of the story would be superfluous, since millions have read and thousands have reviewed this outstanding novel over the past 12 years. I, however, will not have any reservation in butchering what Mr. Mahendras cooked up as his own additions. Once again every addition or deviation from the original English script by Stephen King has tarnished the tone and atmosphere of the story. Drinking a bottle of red wine after the completion of every creation is a habit of the author in the story. However it does not have cultural significance when seen from an Tamil perspective. The same argument can be applied to candle lit dinners. What was the need for the wife and paati and friend and all those useless extras. Did they contribute in anyway towards the story. In fact the fear factor of being the captive of a deranged woman was diluted due to distractions by such unnecessary family elements. There is nothing dishonorable or disgraceful about adapting a novel for a regional audience. It has been done successfully in the past by countless film makers. The keyword being ‘‘Adaptation’’. Copying a Hollywood film frame to frame is not Adaptation. Its known in the industry as a remake. A good example of an adaptation of a world classic to a regional language is a little known Malayalam film called. ‘‘Kalliyattom’’. This story of a Theyam dancer is an adaptation of William Shakespeare’s Othello. Credit has also been given to Bill in this film. However Balu Mahendra decided to leave out Stephen King altogether and hijacked the writing credits all to himself. Shameful Mr. Mahendra.

Verdict: We have a fine high grade black pepper in Kerala. Regardless of what you do with the meat, fish or the rest of the ingredients, as long as this pepper is used the dish will taste great. Its not the food its the pepper that makes it tasty. Saritha and Jayram are that fine high grade black pepper. Despite the photocopied script and dimwitted photography, this second hand story is still worth seeing.